Susan Writes

I ate the last Christmas cookie.  No, I savored that cookie with ceremony.  A second cup of coffee, flavored with vanilla, a half spoonful of sugar.  But I was sad.

            This star sugar cookie, covered with yellow icing, red sprinkles and red-hot candies, was the last one that my Grands decorated a week before Christmas.  The last one on my glass platter.  As I bit one star point, I remembered the anticipation of Cookie Decorating Day.

            Right after Thanksgiving eight-year-old Micah asked, “Gran, are we going to decorate Christmas cookies?”  Yes.  “When?” was the next question.  His three older sisters asked questions during the three weeks.  Did you get more sprinkles? Can we bake lots of trees? Last time we ran out of red food coloring; did you get more?  Will we make gingerbread men like we always do?

            The question that surprised me was 17-year-old Samuel’s: “Gran, can I come by myself to decorate cookies?”  It took me back to the time when he was the only Grand and stood on a stool and smeared icing everywhere and there were more sprinkles on the kitchen counter and the floor than on cookies. 

            I’ll forever keep the pictures when just two weeks ago Samuel and Husband spread green icing and then very carefully placed individual cylinder shape sprinkles on tree cookies

            Earlier that day, Samuel’s four younger siblings had stood around our kitchen island – each with a stack of plain cookies.  They laughed and reached across each other for sprinkles and waited patiently, or impatiently, for someone to finish with the bowl of red or green or yellow or blue or white icing. 

            They spilled sprinkles.  They ate sprinkles.  They iced their fingers and licked them.  They counted how many cookies they had decorated and compared with how many everyone else had decorated. 

            When all the cookies were finished, each Grand put a few on my Christmas platter. 

I wondered who had decorated this last cookie I was eating and for a few moments, I felt sad.  The happiness, the fun of Christmas 2022 cookie decorating would never exactly be repeated.

            My memories went to other times that will never exactly be repeated.  Son’s family, who lives miles and miles away, came to visit. All eight Grands and their parents sat with Husband and me around our dining room table – to eat and play Bingo and visit.

            Exchanging gifts with a group of friends that Husband and I first knew more than forty years ago when we declared ourselves The Gourmet Group.  A first day of 2023 hike led me to the place my mom waited to catch the school bus. 

            We cherish times that we look forward to and love and wish didn’t end. I think of advice from Dr. Seuss’s book, The Cat in the Hat:  Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.  

            Enjoy the moment, hold the memories, and smile.  Then make a plan. Valentine’s Day cookie decorating will be fun.

Filed under: Everyday Life, Inspirational | Tagged: cry |